Thoughts on parenting, gardening, chicken-ing, and living in Charlotte

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Back to Plan A

We had a follow-up visit with our Reproductive Endocrinologist (RE) yesterday. Although I was not altogether thrilled with our first visit, we were asked to come back after we got the results back from the chromosonal test of the last m/c and all my bloodwork, if the results were negative.

Well, all the results were negative, so I wanted to see what our "new" options were.

Oddly, the RE was more interested in the two chem pgs I've had since the m/c than the test results. My multitude of chem pgs, along with the neg results from baby's chromosonal tests, suggest a possible auto-immune issue in that I'm "allergic" to a baby implanting and my body is trying to reject it. (I may be over stating the case here, but that's what I took from it). It's hard to test for an auto-immune problem with pg, but it does follow a bit from what Dr. Alan Beer has argued about women who have recurrent miscarriages. Our doctor thinks Beer took a sledgehammer to the small-nail problem and thus turned off a great deal of the medical community. Our RE would consider himself Beer-light (or lite-beer!) in his approach; he wants to take the edge off my auto-immunity responses, but not make me susceptible to dying from the treatment. (Thanks! I appreciate that!!)

So, we're starting a whole new regime for the next 6 to 9 months or so. I stay on my folic acid, pre-nates and baby aspirin all the time. Then, after ovulation and for the next 14 days or so, I take a very small dose of prednisone, a small amount of heparin (belly shots!), and the progesterone supplements. And we'll see what happens. If my body is trying to reject these pgs even though they are viable, this should help.

Another miscarriage, especially without chromosonal problems, could rule out this as a problem. And a successful pregnancy wouldn't necessarily mean that this worked, but it could be helpful.

The dealio with this treatment is "It won't hurt, it might help." At this point, if I had any scientific evidence that dancing naked in the backyard during a full moon might help and wouldn't hurt, I'd do that, too. Nonetheless, the screams of my neighbors poking their eyes out at the sight makes that option a community health hazard, and thus, harmful. So no naked dancing. But some steroids and blood thinners? That I'll do.

Yes, I do know that this is all about perceived control. But I'm glad to have a plan. And I'm glad the plan involves trying something to help me have a baby on my own.

At the end of this time period, if we don't have a successful pregnancy, I'll be in much a much better place to say "We've tried the best we could, now let's move on to something else." And by that time, we should be at higher places on all the lists we're on so we can have more options quickly at our fingertips.

A couple of intrusively curious questions (autoimmunity fascinates me, and is also a personal issue):

what does the doc consider a mini-dose of prednisone?

does the fact that you had a pretty much uneventful & healthy pregnancy with Conor support the autoimmune hypothesis, i.e., the initial pregnancy sensitized your immune system to make all subsequent pregnancies problematic?

Gabriella, he doesn't think I'm allergic to Dave, but that Dave and I might have some similarity issues that could be a problem. (then I joked about being cousins!)

Monica--What numbers do you mean?

Veronica--

5 mg of prednisone is his idea of low dose. He did not discuss how the autoimmunity could have started, if indeed that is what it is. Beer does argue that the more pgs, the more likely one is to develop this problem. I've been pregnant 4, 7 or 9 times depending on how we count the "events."

Sounds really good to me! Congrats on the plan, good luck with the regime, and enjoy the heparin shots! Don't forget to make sure you are not bleeding when you leave the house. Twice I had major slow leaks from the lovenox shots. Messy, sticky, but not fatal. Thank goodness I was wearing black.

About Me

I am a psychology professor, wife, and mother of three including a 6 year old boy and toddler boy/girl twins. On this blog, you're going to find information about my experiences as a working mother and our efforts to keep our house and gardens functioning. Go back long enough and you'll learn about our journey to complete our family (10 pregnancies, 2 births, 3 kids) and remodel our home . On this blog, as in my life, the boundaries of my life often blur.